


something to believe in

by pathstotread



Category: Newsies!: the Musical - Fierstein/Menken
Genre: F/M, M/M, Multi, OT3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-18
Updated: 2018-09-18
Packaged: 2019-07-13 18:18:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,099
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16023368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pathstotread/pseuds/pathstotread
Summary: “It’s Katherine who makes the call, of course.”David feeling morose on Jack and Katherine’s wedding day, completely oblivious to the fact that Katherine has Plans.





	something to believe in

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote the bulk of this well over a year ago when the pro shot of the musical was in theaters, and it hasn’t been beta read, so, uh...forgive me.

Sometimes, David thinks about how easy it would have been for Jack and Katherine to leave him behind. 

Their marriage, while unconventional enough to raise eyebrows and set tongues wagging through New York’s high society, is still a fairly standard story, all things considered. Boy meets girl. Boy, girl, and their best friend lead a citywide worker strike against girl’s father. Boy marries girl. Boy conveniently forgets all the times he and said best friend have made out on the rooftop of the newsboys’ lodging house. 

Happens every day.

But whoever wrote those stories has never met Katherine Plumber.

(It’s Katherine who makes the call, of course. David comes to learn that Katherine calling the shots on most everything important is a matter of necessity.)

\-- 

Katherine and Jack get married at City Hall on a Friday in May, with David and Crutchie acting as witnesses and the rest of the newsies waiting on the street to heckle the newlyweds before migrating to the pub. 

The party is well and truly underway when Katherine floods David’s view in her wedding dress, looking radiant and not a bit annoyed. He’d been morosely staring into his pint, listening to the band playing raucously in the corner as Jack and Crutchie tipsily dance a jig.

“Dance with me,” she says, and it’s not a request, so he follows her to the floor.

David smiles down at Katherine as he leads her in a series of steps. There’s a small, lonely, breakable part of him that wishes he could hate her, even a little bit. She’s brilliant and beautiful and talented, brave in a way he can only dream of being, and from this day on she’s going to walk away with everything he wants. He thinks it’s only fair that he be able to hate her for it. 

But as he spins her under his arm and she kicks up her heels with abandon, he finds himself dumbstruck by just how much he loves her, and how happy he is for her and for Jack. They get each other. They don’t have to be alone.

Katherine leans up to shout in his ear, “we’re staying at the Waldorf tonight.”

David’s brow wings up. “Swanky.”

“A begrudging wedding present from dear old Dad,” she laughs, her eyes sparkling.

“Big of him.”

“He certainly thought so.” The band finishes a song with a flourish, the room loud with cheers and applause. “David,” she says, her face sobering ever so slightly. He’s not sure if he’s more struck by this or by the fact that no one besides his mother has called him David in months. 

Katherine takes a deep breath. “Nine o’clock. Room 202. Don’t be late.” And before he can process what the hell she means, she grabs his face, kisses him smack on the mouth, and whirls away, straight into Elmer’s arms.

“ _What_ ,” he says aloud to no one in particular.

Three hours later, when he knocks on the door of Room 202 at the Waldorf-Astoria, feeling like a fraud in his frayed jacket and spit shined shoes, he’s still asking himself the same question. The door swings open, and there’s Jack, still in his best and only suit but with his hair noticeably rumpled and his tie hanging drunkenly around his neck.

“Dave. Hey.” Jack backs into the room to let David slip by.

As the door clicks shut, David turns and says “Jack, what-” but is cut off by Jack crowding him back against the wall and kissing him soundly.

_Both the Kelly-Plumbers in one day_ , David thinks in something of a panic as his hands flutter uselessly at his sides. _Is this some kind of wedding tradition I don’t know about?_ Then Jack tilts his head and grips David’s arms and David finds it difficult to think of anything at all, impossible to do anything except grasp Jack’s back with both hands and try to give as good as he gets.

(They’ve only done this a handful of times, each one burned into David’s memory like photo negatives developing in a darkroom. They’ve never talked about what it means - no time for emotions when you’re trying to get each other off before the bell rings and twenty of your closest friends wake up and start yelling about the headlines. 

David still jolts awake at night thinking of the last time Jack kissed him, right after saying “Katherine said yes” and right before striding away and climbing down the fire escape.

And that had been the right move to make. No one could take one look at Jack and Katherine together, watch how much they infuriate each other right before making each other laugh so hard they’re crying, and doubt that they belong together.)

Jack bites David’s lower lip and David lets out a truly embarrassing moan, his head thunking back against the wall. “Wait. Wait wait wait.”

“What for?” Jack says, nipping down David’s jawline as his hands tug at David’s tie. 

“What _for_?” David yelps, his voice hitting a new octave. “You just got _married_ today. What about -”

“Oh good, you’re here,” Katherine says from the door of the en suite. 

At the sound of her voice, Jack lifts his head and David feels him freeze as he gets his first glimpse of Katherine. She’s swapped her dress for some satiny, strappy piece of lingerie that covers basically everything but leaves exactly nothing to the imagination. Her rich, chestnut hair tumbles down her back in waves. 

“Jesus, Mary and Joseph,” Jack gasps, sagging against David like standing is suddenly too much for him.

Katherine grins like the cat that caught the canary as she crosses the room to meet them. “It’s new, and I must say, suddenly worth every penny.”

“I’ll say,” Jack says fervently, his eyes scanning up and down like he just can’t decide where to focus.

“ _Hey_!” David doesn’t realize he’s shouted until both Jack and Katherine swing their heads to look at him. “Anyone gonna tell me what the hell is going on here?”

“I would have thought it was rather obvious,” Katherine says.

“Yeah, Dave, what did you think happened when folks got hitched?” Jack asks, a devilish light in his eyes. David suddenly feels like he’s been dropped in a comedy show and no one’s bothered to provide him with his lines.

“I _mean_ ,” he says, with what he thinks is an extraordinary amount of patience, “why am I here? Why are you both jumping me when you’re supposed to be jumping each other?”

“Oh, we plan to do plenty of that,” Jack says, his hand running reverently up Katherine’s bare arm, his other hand still solid on David’s shoulder.

Katherine looks at David, taking in his gobsmacked expression, before turning to her husband. “Jack Kelly,” Katherine chides. “Did you say anything at all to him when he arrived, or did you just jump him without a word?”

Jack has the good grace to look sheepish. “Um. Maybe the second thing?”

“Criminy,” Katherine sighs, rolling her eyes before turning to David. She reaches her hand out, presses her cool palm into his.

“Here’s the thing,” she says, her voice no-nonsense, but with the tiniest undercurrent of...nervousness? “Jack told me he ended things, with you-”

“She _knew_?” David says, his eyes flying to Jack.

Katherine smiles. “Oh, Davey, when are you going to learn that I know everything?”

Jack shrugs a shoulder. “She’s not wrong.”

David turns his panicked gaze back to Katherine. “I’m so sorry, Katherine.”

“God, you’re almost as obtuse as _he_ is,” Katherine says, jerking her head toward Jack. “There’s nothing to be sorry for. You two may not see eye-to-eye on much, but it’s so obvious that you’re each other’s favorite person in the world. It just makes sense.”

David suddenly feels very _seen_ , as if everything he’s ever felt, everything he’s ever tried to hide is on display. He says the only thing he can think of, which is, “But...Jack loves you.”

Katherine slides a sideways glance to Jack. “I don’t think he’s getting it.”

Jack shakes his head. “Seems fairly straightforward to me.”

Katherine lets out a short bark of laughter. “Aren’t you Mister Cool Customer, acting like you didn’t react exactly the same way when I brought it up two weeks ago.” 

She grabs both of their hands and pulls them back into the room toward the settee. David follows, still in a daze. Jack slings one leg up, his sock-clad foot resting on the cushion, and Katherine settles into the cradle of his legs and leans back against his chest, still grasping David’s hand in hers.

“I _know_ Jack loves me,” she says. “And I love Jack.” She tilts her head back to glance at him. “More than I thought I’d ever love anyone.” Jack leans down and kisses her neck for that. “But Davey,” she continues. “You have to know that Jack loves you, too.”

David looks at Jack, who’s still smiling, but with a hint of uncertainty that hadn’t been there a moment ago. David’s heart lurches in his chest.

“He thought he had to be this self-sacrificing hero and give you up for me, so he did, the idiot.”

“Hey,” Jack objects. 

Katherine arches her brow and continues as if he hasn’t spoken. “Only I never asked him to do that. I would never expect him to choose one love over another.”

David shakes his head, knowing what he’s going to say will break what’s left of his heart but needing to say it anyway. “That’s not how this works. You guys are perfect together. You’re gonna have a family and change the world-”

Katherine grabs David’s other hand, squeezes tightly. “And we can’t do any of that without you.” 

“Dave,” Jack says. David meets his gaze. “As soon as Plumber mentioned it, it all made sense. We’re married, sure, but we’re also…”

“Yours,” Katherine finishes. “If you want us.”

The room falls silent for a moment. David’s not sure he’s still breathing.

Jack shrugs, his face vulnerable in a way David’s never seen. “The three of us, we’re kind of a package deal, yeah?”

David’s eyes dart to Katherine and back to Jack, his pulse hammering in his throat. “I mean, we can’t just - can we? What would people think?”

“People,” Katherine says primly, “can go jump in a lake for all I care.”

“Ditto.” Jack looks solemnly at David, and anyone who didn’t know him would never detect the nerves in his voice when he says, “But it’s up to you.”

David takes a beat, and thinks. Maybe he takes two, or a hundred, he’s not sure. 

It’s crazy. 

It’s ridiculous.

It’s somehow the first thing that’s made sense to him in his entire life.

David says “Oh, thank God” on an exhale and launches himself at both of them.

\--

Kissing Jack is like coming home, every time. That hasn’t changed. But David’s surprised to find that kissing Katherine, while new, feels much the same. 

They take their time to get acquainted, kissing long and languidly with her perched in his lap and Jack watching intently, his gaze searing. After a good long while, they all make their way to the bed (big enough for three, which might be the first thing David has ever thanked Mr. Pulitzer for).

David would be lying if he said he’d never dreamed of a scenario like this, but even in his sleep, it had always been Jack and Katherine together, David watching from a distance, as if on the wrong side of a pane of glass. In his wildest dreams, he could never have imagined what this would feel like - touching them both, being touched in return. Being loved. Belonging.

Later that night, his head pillowed on Katherine’s chest and Jack snoring softly into his shoulder, David whispers, “why?”

Katherine cards her fingers through his hair and says, “Because he needs you. We both do.”

\--

Jack and Katherine have always talked about how meeting the other took them completely by surprise, but David thinks he could give them, or anyone, a run for their money. Growing up with his folks and his books, he’d never expected any of what was to come - ending up in the union, working to give people a voice, helping turn New York on its head. 

But most of all, he could never have imagined anyone like Jack or Katherine claiming him as their own. One would have been a surprise. Both is a downright miracle.

If nothing else, David Jacobs has learned to believe in miracles.

_end_


End file.
